What happened this week in history
In 1429, Joan of Arc liberated Saint-Pierre-le-Moûtier, in the Armagnac–Burgundian Civil War.
1677 – The future Mary II of England married William, Prince of Orange. They would later jointly reign as William and Mary.
1846 - Benjamin Palmer patented an artificial leg.
1847 - Scottish obstetrician James Young Simpson discovered the anaesthetic qualities of chloroform.
1879 - James Ritty patented the first cash register, to combat stealing by bartenders in his Ohio saloon.
1890 - London’s first deep-level tube railway opened, between King William Street and Stockwell.
1921 - Japanese Prime Minister Hara Takashi was assassinated in Tokyo.
1922 - In Egypt, British archaeologist Howard Carter and his men found the entrance to Pharaoh Tutankhamun’s tomb in the Valley of the Kings.
1924 - Nellie Tayloe Ross of Wyoming was elected the first female governor in the United States.
1924 - The Labour government of Ramsay MacDonald resigned.
1958 - Pope John XXIII, the son of a poor Italian farmer, was crowned 262nd pontiff of the Roman Catholic Church on the balcony of St Peter’s Basilica in a four-hour ceremony, watched by 200,000 spectators in St Peter’s Square.
1963 - John Lennon uttered his infamous “rattle your jewellery” line at the Royal Variety Performance in London.
1970 - Genie, a 13-year-old feral child, was found in Los Angeles having been locked in her bedroom for most of her life.
1980 - Former Hollywood actor Ronald Reagan defeated Democrat Jimmy Carter in the US presidential elections by a huge majority.
1995 - Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated as he left a peace rally in Tel Aviv.
2001 - The film Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone had its world premiere in London.
2008 - Barack Obama became the first person of African-American descent to be elected President of the United States.